For every practice or race during the Isle of Man TT, organisers have enjoyed the luxury of having almost double the required marshals positioned around the Mountain Course.

For a session to safely get underway, 565 marshals need to be positioned around the 37 and three quarter mile course.

This year, the majority of sessions have had up to 900.

In previous years, TT organisers have had to issue a public appeal for potential marshals to come forward due to numbers dwindling on certain qualifying or race days.

Andy Priestley, one of two chief marshals with the Isle of Man Marshals Association, described the turn-around in numbers as ‘amazing’ and explained why he thinks so many people are signing up this year.

‘We’re running nearly double numbers which is great and we’ve had really good support so far, we’ve got 800 to 900 marshals every day, which is amazing!

‘It’s a massive positive, we’ve been doing some advertising and streaming of videos and stuff like that, with it going live on TT plus the global audience is becoming far more aware.

‘People are coming over, or coming back and realising it’s good to get involved and be part of the big team.

‘The best thing about it is being involved in the best event in the world, road racing is fantastic and you don’t get closer to the action than this and the riders support us and really appreciate what you do.’

Andy described his role with the association. He said: ‘I’m one of the directors but I also work in the office (at the Grandstand) and we administer all the background signing on allocation of marshals.’

How to become an Isle of Man TT marshal

If interested in marshaling the TT, you can go to iomttmarshals.com.

All you need to do is provide details and pass two online training models, which take around 20 minutes each.

Once complete, you can register to marshal, then head to the Marshals Association tent at the Grandstand and get your pass and new tabard.